Craig Russell - Lennox

The sister left me in the day room. I took in the huge windows opening out onto the gardens, the wood panelling, the ornate cornicing. The Victorian architect of this house had imagined a patrician family spending mornings in this room, secure in their place within the governing machinery of a British Empire on which the sun never set. But two wars had turned the world on its head and the Empire on its ass and now Levendale House and its elegant morning room were home to wounded ex-servicemen who had no place anywhere else.

The sister’s warning was not overdone. When she returned she pushed a wheelchair into the room. It was clear that Lance Corporal William Pattison and a grenade had encountered one another at very close quarters. What I couldn’t work out was which had taken the biggest bite out of the other. One side of Pattison’s face was gone and his mouth had been reduced to a lopsided, lipless slit. Whatever arts and crafts they encouraged here, playing the trumpet was not going to be an option for Pattison. Taut new skin had been stretched over where the right side of his jaw, his right cheek and eye should have been.

The left side of his face was pretty messed up too and gave the impression that someone had pushed all the features around and hadn’t managed to get them exactly where they had been before, added to which there had clearly been extensive burning to what was left of his face. Lon Chaney had nothing on this guy. The mask twisted into a grimace and I realized that Pattison was trying to smile at me.

‘I don’t get a lot of visitors,’ he said. You don’t say, I thought. His voice was wet, the words chewed in his half mouth. Like I had told the sister, I’d seen my share, but looking at Pattison made me feel pretty sick. I did my best to smile. I consoled myself with the fact that even if my smile was half-hearted, it was twice as good as Pattison would ever manage. ‘Sister says you know Tam.’

‘Our paths crossed,’ I said. I realized that Pattison didn’t know that McGahern had died. I decided not to say anything for the moment. I’d see how the conversation went. The poor fuck had enough to contend with.

‘What unit were you in?’ Pattison asked. I noticed that the right side of his body was limp. Paralysed, I guessed.

‘First Canadian. Italy, Holland and Germany.’

‘How did you know Tam then?’ There seemed to be no suspicion in Pattison’s voice. But there again inflection was difficult when you were half a tongue and sixteen teeth down on the deal.

‘Long story. You were with him in Gideon?’

‘And before. Tam was my sergeant. He saved my skin more times than I can remember.’

‘What about…’ I clumsily indicated the wheelchair.

‘Oh… that was after Tam was shipped home. My own stupid fault. Acting the big bollocks. I didn’t take cover quick enough.’

‘What kind of guy was Tam? I mean back then? To be honest, I only really caught up with him towards the end of the war.’

‘The best. The absolute best. Our unit had this officer — really good as officers go, and you had to be hard to be part of Gideon, even if you was an officer. But he was all theory. Tam was the bloke you wanted running things when shite started to fly. Was you an NCO yourself?’

‘No. Officer. Captain.’

‘Oh, sorry sir. Didn’t mean no disrespect. About officers, I mean.’

‘None taken, Billy. I came across my fair share of wankers with pips on their shoulders myself. Anyway I’m not an officer now.’ I pulled a chair up opposite his wheelchair and sat down. ‘You and Tam saw a lot of action with Gideon, I take it?’

‘Oh aye. We was in the thick of it. Our unit was mainly Jews and a couple of Sudanese. Won’t hear anything against them. I learned a lot when I was out there. Tough bastards, particularly them Jewish blokes. They had been fighting the Arabs for years. If you needed them to kick arses then they didn’t need a second telling. Got their own country now, of course. God help any poor bastard that tries to take it from them.’

‘The Jewish men in your unit… Tam told me some of them were ex-members of the Special Night Squads.’

‘Aye. That’s right. Most of them if not all. That’s what I meant. They had seen a lot of action before the war. Taking out Arab resistance units. Protecting the Iraqi petroleum pipeline, that kind of stuff. Real hard bastards. And they really hated the Germans. Not many prisoners were taken, if you catch my drift. But them Jewish lads were a great laugh. Tam really got on with them. He was interested in that kind of thing. You know, the history and stuff about the Middle East. That’s why he got on so well with our officer. He’d been a journalist or something before the war. Correspondent I think you call them. Middle East was his special thing.’

‘Do you know if Tam kept in touch with any of the other members of your unit?’

‘I would think so. He looked me up all right. Don’t you know that it was Tam who got my face fixed up?’

I was confused for a moment. I did my best to sweep the that’s it fixed up? expression that must have flashed across my face. ‘You’ve heard from Tam since the end of the war?’

‘Oh aye. He visited me four, maybe five times. To start with I had to have a dressing on my face. For months. The wound just wouldn’t heal and there was always a danger of me getting infected. They was trying to sort me out with a surgeon who could fix it, but the main man was always booked up. Tam sorted it all out for me. He paid for me to have it done private. The best plastic surgeon in the business. Mr Alexander Knox. I don’t know how Tam managed to get him, even paying. But it was Mr Knox who fixed me up. I’m really pleased with the result.’

‘He did a great job,’ I said and smiled. But don’t ’phone Sam Goldwyn and ask if he’s looking for a new leading man, I thought. ‘When was the last time you saw Tam?’

‘About a year ago,’ Pattison said and some saliva bubbled at the corner of his slit mouth. Lips must have cost extra. ‘He was looking very flash. He’s in business now. Doing really well for himself.’

‘Did you know Tam’s brother at all?’

‘No. Never met him, but heard all about him. They was identical twins, you know, but Tam hated his brother. Tam said he could never work out how two brothers could be so alike on the outside but so different on the inside. He said his brother was rotten. Yellow. And a rat.’

‘Did Tam talk about him much?’

‘Tam didn’t talk about anything much. He listened. But when he did say something it was worth hearing. But aye… he did talk about his brother a bit. He said his brother was a shirker who’d dodged his call-up. Tam seemed worried that he’d left his brother in charge of the family business, whatever it was they did.’

There was a pause. I looked out of the bay windows again and commented on how nice the gardens were. Truth was I was taking a break from looking at Pattison’s face.

‘Did you ever come across a Jimmy Wallace in the army?’ I asked eventually.

‘Not Jimmy Wallace… Jamie Wallace. You know how toffs are with names. That’s who I was talking about earlier, when I said about our officer. That was him. Captain Jamie Wallace, the guy who had been a journalist before the war. The Middle East expert. He led our unit and did a pretty good job of it, but like I said it was Tam who was in charge when it came to fighting.’

I thought about what he had said. An officer. Why would an ex-army officer end up as a hanger-on to a thug gangster? ‘How did Tam get on with Wallace?’

‘They got on all right. Captain Wallace relied on Tam and Tam was always interested in what the Captain had to say. They was different types, but they seemed to really get on.’